-Seven Days - CerebralError + TakodaVega-

[CerebralError]

-Day One-

   Adam Wilcox drummed his fingers on the steering wheel of the White Creek Sheriff's Department SUV, watching the dismal trickle of cars that rolled down the main road through town. The air conditioner was cranked up to full blast, to counter the 107°F temperatures outside, and it wasn't even high noon yet. It might have been the beginning of October, but damned if the weather didn't seem to notice. He drained what was left of a cup of coffee and tossed the empty cup into a plastic bag down in the passenger-side footrest, turning his attentions back to the street outside. He was supposed to be on the lookout for speeding cars, but he figured it was an exercise in futility. School was back in session, so kids would – should – be at their classes, and the few delinquents who had tried to play hooky had already been reeled in for the most part. And the adults were either at work already or commuting to their job somewhere out of town. For all intents and purposes, White Creek was dead at this hour.

   And it wasn't like someone breaking the law here would go unnoticed. The town boasted a population of barely 2,000 people. Everybody knew everybody. Hell, Adam had probably met almost all of them at least once. Traffic stops were practically on a first name basis. If someone broke the law, someone was bound to know who had done it. And while there was some public worry about the rise of cartel activity south of the border, it was both his and the sheriff department's opinion that they were more of a concern to South Texas than a small community out in the middle of the New Mexico desert. The last time a town in New Mexico had come under attack was the raid by the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa in 1916, and that was Columbus, New Mexico, nearly 30 miles away. No one would find White Creek a juicy target. Not even the cartels.

   The radio clicked briefly and a gravely female voice crackled over the vacant airwaves. "Adam, This is dispatch. You there?" While such a casual nature of conversation might have been frowned upon in larger cities, in White Creek it was fairly normal, with less than ten people working in the Sheriff's office.

   Adam reached over and picked up the receiver. "Yeah, Midge. I'm here. What's up?" Midge Fletcher was the local dispatcher, had been for as long as Adam could remember. Sixty-eight years old and smoked like a chimney, but she was a warhorse, refused to quit her job. And as long as she could do it and wasn't slipping into senility, the Sheriff didn't have the heart to let her go.

   "We just got a call in from old Albert." Even through the static of the radio and the ravaging effects of decades of smoking, he could still hear the amusement in her voice. And he understood why. Albert McClintock, a.k.a Crazy Al, was the local loony, living at the very limits of the town's jurisdiction. He wasn't dangerous or anything, but every other week he called in to the Sheriff's Office with a report of some nature or another. Most of them were reports of alien spacecraft, or that he saw government agents spiking his water well with mind control agents. Crazy Al was all the proof Adam needed that living alone in the desert was extremely bad for you.

   "What is it this time, Midge? The cacti are walking around again? Or did JFK show up for a bottle of water?" He chuckled softly, but he checked the clock on the dash. As trying as dealing with Crazy Al was, it would probably beat sitting here doing nothing.

   "Nothing of that nature." Again, he could hear the amusement in her voice. "But he did say that he thought he might have heard a wolf last night. And that a 'strange' car filled up at his pump this morning. Paid in cash. Said she gave him a 'bad vibe'."

   "Probably just coyotes." He muttered when he was informed about the so-called wolf, but then he shrugged. "I'll go check it out anyway. If anything, I can ask him nicely only to call in unless it's serious. Not that he'd listen anyway." A harsh laugh rasped over the radio. Midge and the Sheriff had been dealing with Crazy Al and his calls since before Adam even joined the Force. Their requests for legitimate emergency calls had been ignored time and time again. As for the customer... "Did she actually harm him in any way?"

   "Didn't sound like it." Midge replied.

   "Not much about that, then. Although I feel sorry for her. When was the last time Al had those pumps filled? I can't imagine how much sediment was in there." Hopefully she – whoever she was – had managed to make it to town first. He started the SUV up and pulled out onto the main road, New Mexico State Road 9, and headed east out of town into the sprawling flat deserts beyond the town's limit.